Yemeni court gives five journalists suspended jail terms

New York, May 25, 2010—The Sana'a appeal court in Yemen should overturn suspended jail sentences given to an editor and four reporters, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today. The sentences come just a few days after local media reported that President Ali Abdullah Saleh pardoned all journalists being tried or convicted of press offenses to mark the 20th anniversary of Yemen's unification.

On Monday, the Press
and Publication Court in Sana'a sentenced Editor Sami Ghaleb, and reporters Abdel
Aziz al-Majidi, Fouad Mas’ad, and Shafee' al-Abd of independent weekly Al-Nidaa
to a three-month suspended jail sentence for “publishing false reports liable
to incite violence,” according
to local news reports. Prominent writer and regular contributor to Al-Nidaa
Mayfa’ Abdel Rahman al-Qiyadi was given the same sentence. Neither the defendants
nor their lawyers were present at the verdict because the court did not inform
them of the hearing date, Ghaleb told CPJ. He said they would all appeal the
sentences.

“We’re confused by
this conviction because it would appear that these journalists are covered by
President Saleh’s pardon,” said Joel Simon, CPJ's Executive Director. “We hope
and expect that these sentences will be nullified.”

The trial for the five
journalists began in November 2009 after Minister of Information Hassan
al-Lawzi ordered an investigation of six issues of Al-Nidaa that had
been published in March and April 2009. The articles and editorials under
investigation focused on civil unrest in the southern part of Yemen, Ghaleb told CPJ.

Two journalists have
been released from jail since Saleh’s declaration of amnesty. Muhammad
al-Leswas was released today, according to news Web site Al-Sahwa, and Hani
Bashraheel, the managing editor of Al-Ayaam, was freed on May 10,
before the amnesty. The two remaining journalists in jail, Fuad Rashid and Salah al-Saqldi, went on hunger strike today at Sana'a Central Prison to
protest their continued imprisonment.